Symbiosis
by Cantare
Summary: Members of the Aburame clan never die alone. But when they are near death, the symbiosis with their insects begins to break.


It was the fifth kunai that finally took him down.

He hit the ground faster than he could ever remember, without the swarm to cushion his fall.

Blood was exiting his wounds too quickly; the remaining bugs could no longer staunch the flow within his body.

The sixth kunai was not thrown, but plunged with calculated carelessness into his kidney. His enemy smiled down on him cruelly, blood speckling his tanned face. Through cracked lenses, Shino could see his skin beginning to glow orange once more as he set his body alight with chakra.

The ninja withdrew the embedded kunai with a vicious jerk and held its bloodied edge against the flames emanating from his pores. Shino heard the crackle and hiss of his own blood in the fire. The blade began to glow red with heat.

Strewn around his incapacitated form were desiccated insect carcasses. He had finally encountered an enemy immune to his attacks; his fiery skin burned every insect that flew near to a crisp.

He watched, unmoving, as the glowing edge of the kunai arced downward once more. There would be no seventh.

* * *

_The grass prickled his skin. He picked at it idly with small, chubby fingers, hearing his mother's voice speaking to someone else a distance away._

_Green. The blades he had plucked from the ground were all green, and the color was smearing on some of his skin._

_Something black showed up. It crawled over his hand, over the blades of grass staining his skin. Black, a contrast to green. The texture of the thing's movement tickled. He wished there were more._

_He smiled as more of the black things appeared from his sleeve._

* * *

Something pierced his insides before the enemy's blade hit.

* * *

_He flinched at the sudden sensation somewhere inside him and stopped walking. His father looked back at him curiously._

"_What's the matter, Shino?"_

"_I don't know, Dad…something funny happened, in here," he said, pointing to the left side of his chest. His hand wavered as he felt it again in a different place. "There it was again! In my arm this time."_

"_Ah," his father said knowingly. "The oldest in your swarm are dying. Once an insect dies, it is devoured by its brothers."_

_His eyes widened as he looked up at his father. "That's…I don't want that to happen!"_

"_It has to happen, son. Otherwise your body will fill up with dead bugs and you'll die. Do you want that?"_

_He gulped. "No."_

_His father smiled. "You'll get used to it. Pretty soon you won't even notice it anymore."_

* * *

There was a ping of metal as the glowing blade was deflected a split-second before it could plunge into his skin. 

There was a seventh kunai after all.

"SHINO!"

The ninja standing over him was too slow to react. A whirlwind of white fur and teeth struck him, and suddenly he was gone from Shino's limited range of vision.

He smiled as he heard rather than saw the girl who had thrown the seventh kunai.

"Shino-kun…"

* * *

"_Stupid freak."_

_He kept his face lowered to the ground, half-hidden within the high collar of his jacket, but his feet started moving faster. He passed the older boy who had spoken, knowing that he had yet to pass the boy's friends._

"_Hey, I'm talking to you."_

_He kept walking._

_A hand grabbed the collar of his jacket and dragged him up to meet a smirking face._

"_I don't like being ignored, especially by bug-infested freaks like you. You made my sister cry, you know that? Why don't you shove your little ant farm up your ass and keep it there, huh?"_

_Someone swung a stick at his head, and his vision burst into stars._

_He fell to the ground, tears already stinging his eyes behind the dark glasses he had taken to wearing._

"_I'll teach you to keep your pests to yourself," the boy sneered, brandishing the stick in one hand._

_Screwing his eyes shut, he covered his head with his hands. The boy laughed and swung._

_In a split-second, the sharp whistle of the stick was drowned out by a surge of shrill, angry buzzing, the corrosive sound seeming to fill the air around them._

_He looked up and saw abject fear on the faces of the older kids around him. The end of the stick that would have hit him was swarming with insects, which quickly spread around the sides and shaved the wood to sawdust within seconds. The boy jerked his hand away as if he'd been burned, and backed off with wide eyes. The others followed his lead and ran off, away from the hovering swarm of black surrounding Shino._

_He picked himself off the ground and kept walking toward his home. The insects settled back into his body, close to his wildly beating heart. Somehow, having them there eased the stinging on the side of his head._

"_Thanks," he said quietly._

* * *

"Don't thank me, Shino-kun!" she said desperately, her normally timid voice raised in alarm and fear for him. "I'm sorry we came so late! I should have been faster—" 

"…s'ok…" he trailed off, tilting his head to the side so he could see her better with his uninjured eye.

He coughed blood as another spear of pain lanced through his insides, followed by the agitated scuttling of insect feet.

* * *

_He had never seen his parents so serious. They were talking in hushed, urgent tones outside his grandfather's door, not wanting him to hear their conversation._

_His grandfather was very old and sick, and seemed frailer each time they visited him. His parents were sad that he would die soon. That much he could understand._

_But his father had brought a kunai with him this time._

_Through the thin panels of the door, he could hear his grandfather's hoarse, delirious pleas for the pain to stop. He had been begging and clawing at his own skin for the past half hour. Was dying always this painful?_

"_Son…my son…end this…this pain…" His grandfather began to say this, again and again._

_Shino was afraid, not knowing what his father would do. Would he use the kunai? What could cause his grandfather such pain that he preferred immediate death?_

_His father stepped inside the room and slid the door shut behind him, leaving Shino's mother behind. She turned to him with a terribly grave expression on her normally pleasant face._

"_Shino, come here. I will tell you what is happening," she said quietly._

_He could hear his father speaking softly to his grandfather now beyond the door. At his mother's stern glare, he focused his attention back on her._

"_You know that all members of the Aburame clan have a binding contract with their insects since birth. They feed off our chakra to live, and in turn we are able to use them for self-defense and battle," she said. He nodded. "But when we are near death and our chakra reserves are almost depleted, they begin to die as well. So they begin to eat however much chakra is left along with our physical bodies, in an attempt to stay alive."_

_He looked at her in horror and understanding. Her lips were pressed into a grim line. "Then grandfather…"_

"_Yes," she said simply. "That is why he is in such pain. And that is why he has asked your father to end it for him."_

_He shuddered, glancing at the door, glad he could not see what would soon happen within._

"_Do not be afraid, Shino," she said, her eyes softening. "It is best to die by the hands of those you love. That is why you should never fight alone. Remember what I've always said: you should find friends whom you can trust, to be by your side when you need them."_

* * *

The sounds of the fight ceased sooner than he thought. He had once again underestimated his teammate's abilities. 

Hinata was trying to heal him, but her chakra reserves were almost gone as well. She must have had a hard fight. Their enemies had separated the three of them in a surprise attack; his bugs hadn't been able to sense their presence through the thick smoke in the aftermath of the forest fire. The ninja who had started that fire had known his weakness all too clearly. The outcome of the battle had been decided from the very beginning.

He heard Kiba running toward him. It sounded like one leg was dragging.

* * *

"_Hey."_

_He kept walking, his collar half-covering his face. He had no reason to talk to his classmates. Most of the things they did and said were mindlessly immature and petty; the rest was usually remarks about how weird he was, whether behind his back or to his face._

"_Hey man, slow down," the voice persisted. The boy jogged up to him, a small white dog tagging along close behind._

"_What do you want?" he said coolly, turning his head only slightly in his direction._

"_Just wanted to tell you that that move you pulled at recess today was really cool," he said cheerfully, running a hand through the unruly mass of his spiky hair. "You should have stuck around to see the look on that guy's face when his girlfriend started laughing at him. It's not every day that a bully like him's beaten up by the kid he's picking on."_

_He looked at the boy without expression. "Is that all?"_

"_Uh, yeah," he said, seemingly unaware that Shino didn't feel like talking. "Well, I'm Kiba. And this is Akamaru."_

_The small dog beside him barked happily. Kiba held out his hand expectantly, and Shino took it after a second's hesitation, when he had withdrawn the bugs in his hand further up his arm._

"_I'm Shino."_

"_I know." Kiba smiled as Shino raised an eyebrow. "Okay, I guess I have a little more to say. I just wanted to thank you, you know, for taking on that asshole today. He's made fun of me a lot too, looks down on my clan…says we're literally a bunch of dumb bitches and sons of bitches. It always makes me really angry, but I've never…well…I was never strong enough to beat him."_

_Shino turned and resumed walking. Kiba followed him. "Hey, I was wondering if you wanted to hang out sometime, you know…maybe train for the next test or something. My family usually doesn't welcome visitors, but I think you could still come over."_

"_Why?" he asked._

_Kiba scratched his head, looking awkward. "Why? Well, I'll tell them you're my friend."_

* * *

He felt a gentle lick on his hand. Akamaru curled against his side, whimpering softly. 

"Shino…" Kiba said raggedly, his blood-streaked face appearing above him. His eyes widened at the extent of the damage the fire ninja had wrought. "Shit, man. Your skin…the burns…"

"Shut up, Kiba!" Hinata said fiercely.

Kiba looked at her in shock. Neither of them had ever heard her utter such vicious words before. The corner of his cracked lips lifted in a half-smile. It turned into a wince of pain as he suddenly felt hundreds of needle-like stabs in his abdomen.

"I'm trying, okay?" she said, her voice breaking. She tried to hold her shaking hands still over his heart. "I'm trying to heal you, Shino-kun…"

* * *

"_Shino." His sensei spoke behind him, her voice gentle and firm. "You're part of a team now. You should talk with your teammates. Get to know them."_

_He turned around to face her out of respect, but didn't respond. She gave him a longsuffering look. "Okay, you've gotten to know one of your teammates already, even though I never see you talk to him much. But what about Hinata? She may not be as talented as you, but you shouldn't ignore her because of that."_

_Despite the advice Kurenai-sensei was giving him about his teammates, the woman hardly knew him either. He didn't ignore people because they were less talented. He just didn't like to talk._

_He'd grown used to the fearful, disgusted stares and insulting comments a long time ago. They had become a mere annoyance. People avoided him, he avoided people. It was simple, and he preferred it that way._

_Except now he was on a team, and he had to train every day with an especially timid girl who always looked at him with fear. She just never said anything about it to his face._

_Kurenai-sensei sighed. "She's at the training grounds by herself right now. She works really hard and just wants to be accepted. I think it would be good if you encouraged her a little, or at least acknowledged her existence."_

_He shrugged. "All right."_

_He found her punching a tree at the edge of the clearing, obviously tired out. The wood bore a large indent where her skinned knuckles had hit it over and over. She sensed his presence and stopped abruptly, turning to him with a flush of embarrassment._

"_Ah…Sh—Shino-kun," she stammered with trepidation._

"_Hinata," he said tersely._

"_I'm sorry…did you…did you want to train here?" she asked, lowering her eyes timidly._

"_No," he said. "Keep going if you want to." He hesitated before adding, "You put a lot of effort into your training."_

_She smiled nervously. Apparently she understood what he meant to say. "Thank you. But I…I can't be as good as you or Kiba."_

_He shrugged. "None of us really care about that." She looked surprised at his statement. He noted the continued unease in her expression and made a rather arbitrary decision._

"_We're on a team," he said, echoing what Kurenai-sensei had said earlier. "You don't have to be afraid of me. The insects only come out when I want them to."_

_She smiled again, somehow more genuinely this time. "I'm not afraid of them, Shino-kun. It's just…"_

"_They're not dirty or diseased either. They're just insects."_

"_I know. I don't mind them at all," she said. It was his turn to look surprised._

_She continued, wringing her hands as she spoke. "It's just that you're so quiet…I mean I'm quiet too, but that's because I'm shy and d--don't have much talent… you're so smart and confident, but you still don't talk…I thought maybe y--you didn't think I was worth your attention."_

_Several seconds of awkward silence followed her admission._

"_I don't look down on you," he said finally. "We're teammates."_

_Her pale silver eyes brightened. It was the first time he had seen her smile touch her eyes._

* * *

"Hinata." Kiba was repeating her name, shaking her gently by the shoulders. "Stop. Stop, let it go." 

"I have to keep trying!" she choked out between tears. She had managed to heal some of the burns on his chest, but they were only surface wounds.

He reached up to brush the unruly strands of her hair out of her face. A lance of pain shot through his arm, and his hand dropped back to his side before he could touch her. The bugs shifted in a wave underneath his skin, then settled back into their feast.

"Don't move, Shino-kun!" she said urgently. "I'm going to save you. I promise!"

"…stop, Hinata…you can stop," he whispered.

He could hear them inside him now, their pincers rending and tearing his flesh, desperately seeking sustenance that was quickly diminishing. Even as they were dying in droves inside him, feeding their brothers with their carcasses, the remaining insects could not be sated without the steady current of chakra they had fed off of their entire lives. The symbiosis was breaking; he could not hold out much longer. He would either pass out from the pain or die inch by inch as the swarm devoured him from the inside out.

Kiba hissed and drew back in surprise. He could smell the blood, the decay inside him. Hinata glanced at him in bewilderment, then turned her Byakugan on Shino's steadily weakening body.

For a second he wondered if her pain was more acute than his; she had never cried like this before, though he had often seen her shed tears.

* * *

"_Don't be overconfident. Battles are always lost that way."_

"_I know."_

"_Be on heightened alert at all times, have some scout beetles monitor your surroundings when you're asleep."_

"_I know."_

"_Get enough rest between rounds, you know that the insects get tired too. Don't let Kiba drag you out for a night on the town."_

"…_Dad, I'm thirteen."  
_

"…_you know what I mean, son."_

_He began to walk away from the door of his home, all his necessities packed neatly in the bag on his back._

"_Wait, Shino," his father said, his voice serious now. He turned to face him. "You've got good friends now, son. Keep them close. Look out for them, defend them with your life. You can trust them to do the same for you. Right?"_

_Friends. His teammates._

_He recalled something his mother had told him when he was a child._

That is why you should never fight alone. Remember what I've always said: you should find friends whom you can trust, to be by your side when you need them.

_He nodded and started on his way to the Chuunin exams._

* * *

"Help me…" 

She swiped the tears from her face with a sleeve, trying to hold back for his sake.

"How…?"

"Juuken…" he said. "Painless…"

She gasped, shaking her head in denial, knowing what he was asking her to do and not wanting to do it. Kiba stood behind her, fists clenched, shaking with barely contained fury and grief at his own helplessness.

His gut seemed to tear apart, twist together, and tear apart again. He coughed up blood, tainted black with the carcasses of insects that had guarded him so faithfully until now.

"Please…" he whispered. "End it…"

"I can't," she sobbed. "Don't ask me to…"

He looked up at his other teammate, silently pleading. Kiba nodded, biting his lip to keep it from trembling, and took Hinata's hand. "Do it, Hinata. It's the best thing."

Her pale eyes didn't leave Shino's face. She gripped Kiba's hand firmly in her own, and raised the other to form the invisible blade that could kill silently, mercifully. Shino closed his eyes, waiting.

"I love you, Shino-kun…and I'm sorry." For once, her voice did not waver.

"Dammit, why…" Kiba's voice finally broke as he cursed. "I'll miss you, man…this isn't the end…"

He opened his eyes to see them one last time, but found that he was blind. Even as the swarm continued to devour him, he thought it was weeping as well through the desperate buzzing and sting of each small death.

It is best to die by the hands of those you love.

_Goodbye, my friends._


End file.
